Administrative

RAM, Storage and new lands to reach

Long time, the IT seems to have slept the winter over in order to feed
us with new data storage gadgets. Seagate has announced a 6TB drive,
SanDisk has announced it’s 128GB microSDXC and Hynix seems to
have built the first 128GB(!) DDR4 memory stripe.

So let’s begin with Seagate. Their HDD is aiming for the data centers out there where it becomes necessary to store immense data capacities on small room. So it’s only logical, that the 6TB drive kicks in here. Pricing at 499 US$ MSRP, this is for sure no bargain at all but the private consumer is not the main target for such high-capacity drives. However some geeks may want to try to get these puppies into their home NAS as well. Based on a 6-platter-design, this drive will for sure be no powersaver nor will it break new speed records. They’re simply-said a data grave and nothing more. For this task, no high speeds are necessary as you mostly do the store’n’forget onto these HDDs anyways. Since the form factor is still 3.5 inches, these HDDs will suit for NAS solutions as well although the price tag will be hefty. With approx. speed tags of 110 MB/s for large files and 15-20 MB/s for smaller files, speeds are way below SSD drives. But the usage scenery is clearly stated so there’s no surprise here. The drives will ship now and are equipped with an SATA-III interface, meaning them to be compatible with modern computers. If they fit your NAS you’ll have to check with your NAS’ manufacturer webiste as most NAS don’t swallow every drive given. So are Synology stations said to be unable to handle WD’s 4GB Red Scorpio drives which are able to run 24/7 and deliver good speed results marking the top-of-the-line HDDs for NAS to date.

Speaking of high-density storage, Sandisk has made the first step to bring 128GB microSDXC cards to the customers. These small fingernails can store a whopping 150hrs of SD video material or 32.000 4MP JPegs on them. In times where smartphone cameras are hitting the 20MP border, these small puppies are strictly necessary. But also the capability to record FullHD video with smartphones these days made it necessary. Although Lexar has claimed the right to announce the first 128GB microSDXC, SanDisk can claim the right to announce to have released the first one to the end user. I have mine ordered already to do some testing, so expect some results online here soon as the card is said to arrive in late April at my desk (hopefully). For those crying for speed and capacity in stick form factor, I can say that the Sandisk Cruzer Extreme 128GB USB3.0 is on it’s way to my desk also for some testing. Why USB3.0? Because copying will go much faster. Imagine 128GB forked over at an average of 31MB/s – that would be a whopping 4200 seconds to fulfill the task, or to be more clear: 70 minutes! Noting for impatient natures in my humble opinion. And if it has to go quick, then you’re lost with USB2. The sticks are rated 240 and 190MB/s read/write speed performance upon large files and will still fork over 50 / 28 MB/s using smaller files. These values appear okay for me as most other sticks cannot keep up with the pace, SanDisk is stating here. But I’ll test it and report here anyway as I don’t trust all these marketing values. However I must say that SanDisk didn’t disappoint me in the past so why should they now? Let’s see then if they keep their promise (again)!

But not only non-volatile memory has the reserved right to set new capacity records. So has Hynix announced it’s first 128GB DDR4 memory module that uses 32 32GBit chips (resulting in a 32x4GB chip design) on one single memory module. Although I doubt that conventional computers will be able to handle them (as there’s possibly an ECC/reg chip between the 8-group of memory chips), the server markets will greatly appreciate them! The demand for more memory is growing, no questions asked here, so it was only a matter of time when the first memory manufacturer was about to fork over such a module. Given a 2133 MHz speed, the memory is about to put thorough 17GB/s with ease. An Ultro-Low-Voltage design, to be clearly stated at 1.2V, will allow even less power consumption and thus allow even more power-saving servers in the upcoming days. As the conventional computer scene ain’t sleeping anyways, I guess it’ll just a matter of time when we see these modules floating around on conventional Pentium Haswell boards also. Since I own a 64GB-based system myself, I can say: More memory ain’t bad anyways but 64GB of RAM is hard to fill already! So expect some interesting usage sceneries for these memory modules in the near future. Maybe Apple is going to build a new Mac Pro with this memory on board. Who knows? Unfortunately, there’s no price tag set up for them so far but you can expect prices far over 1000 US$ upon release time as conventional 2-module kits 8GB DDR3 modules rated DDR3-2133 are already tagged 250 US$ at the moment. So one 128GB module may even hit the sweet spot of 2000 US$ I suppose!

So after a longer break, this blog finally got some news for you again!

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